Latency
Latency is the time it takes for a certain operation to complete in a system. Most often this measure is a time duration, like milliseconds(ms) or seconds(s).
Typical Software System Latency Numbers:
- Reading 1 MB from RAM:
0.25 ms - Reading 1 MB from SSD:
1 ms - Transfer 1 MB over Network:
10 ms - Reading 1MB from HDD:
20 ms - Inter-Continental Round Trip:
150 ms
Throughput
Throughput is the number of operations that a system can handle per time unit. For instance, the throughput of a server can often be measured in Requests Per Second (RPS) or Queries Per Second (QPS).